


Another Held Breath

by Bearfootscar



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, history of Fenris/Hawke
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-15
Updated: 2013-11-15
Packaged: 2018-01-01 14:39:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1045118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bearfootscar/pseuds/Bearfootscar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Out of the blue, Hawke asks Anders to sleep with her in her Hightown mansion.  He thought he had long ago buried his feelings for her, but now they rekindle and flare.  But what about she and Fenris?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Another Held Breath

“Anders, I want you to sleep with me.  Here, tonight, in the mansion.”  She levels her gaze to pierce into his eyes.  To let him know she is serious.

As she expects, he sputters and grows red.

“Hawke, are you mad?  I mean we’re not...you know…” He rubs his hand across the back of his neck and grinds his toe into the Orlesian carpet mother had chosen for the manor shortly after they moved in.

“Me? Mad?  Well, perhaps, but that’s not at issue here,” she chuckles and brings a hand to Anders chin.  Lifting his face to meet hers again, “I’m not kidding.”  She swallows her familiar sarcastic tone.  This must not become a joke.

“Here?  With….you?” His cheeks flush and she can see small droplets of sweat forming on his brow.  

“Yes.”

“In your bed?” His voice cracks at the final word, and she can feel his flesh heating under her fingertips.

“Yes.”  He swallows hard, so she takes his hand into hers.  It trembles.

“What about Fenris?  I thought you two…” His eyes dart away at the name, but she holds him fast.

“Don’t worry about that.  Just you and me, okay?” She feels her cheeks redden, but she keeps her voice low and earnest.

“Hawke, I don’t know about this…”  But she cuts him off mid worry by calling for Orana.

The lithe woman enters the room silently while Hawke maintains her steadfast hold on Anders gaze. “Orana, would you please draw a bath for Anders?  Extra hot, if you please.  And set out another plate for dinner, he’ll be staying the night.”

What an unusual sight they must be.  Faces so close, Hawke holding Anders’ chin, their gazes locked as though engaged in a war of attrition.  But Orana simply nods and backs out of the study leaving the two of them alone again.

“Well, that’s settled then,” Hawke sighs, and after another moment of eye contact to ensure no further protests will be made, she releases Anders and moves to her desk to shuffle about some recently arrived letters.

“Is it?  I’m still not sure what I’ve agreed to,” he rubs his chin absentmindedly where her thumb has left a small white circle.

“Don’t be silly, Anders, I don’t think I could be more clear,” Hawke shrugs off his concern and takes a seat at the desk to sort her papers.  After a few moments of pregnant silence, she tosses a warm smile over her shoulder at him to reassure him of her good intentions.  His cheeks are still flushed, but he nods ever so slightly before Orana reenters the room and beckons him to the washroom.

***

She leads him down the hall and opens the door for him.  After a moment’s hesitation, he slides past her and into the washroom where she promptly closes the door behind him.

The room is hot and humid, the vapors from the bath still rising from the large copper tub in the center of the room.  Extra hot indeed.  He lets out a breath he hadn’t realized he had been holding and looks about the small chamber.  Sandy tiles adorn the room, plain but warm, much like the rest of Hawke’s estate.  A short rack stands to his left, a white fluffy towel draped over it.  It all looks so...inviting.  

He looks back over his shoulder at the closed door behind him.  His thoughts still racing to catch up with the events of the evening.  Did Hawke really just ask him what he thought she asked him?  So suddenly and out of the blue?  She had rebuffed him years ago, and she spends so much of her free time with that beast of an elf… The thought of the two of them together is enough to bring the taste of sick to his mouth, and he’s learned to swallow enough bile in these last few years to shrug it off, but there’s no need to reopen old wounds.  

He lifts his hand to the doorknob to escape the steamy room, but pauses mid motion.  His mind floats back to years-old yearning he thought had been tempered, but images of pressing his lips gently against hers, his hands working their way through her shaggy hair, feeling her arms wrap under his and pressing him tightly against her chest...these images flare and rekindle as though the coals had been banked to simmer under a layer of forgotten ash.  

The room is warm,  his robes feel heavy, and he could certainly not saunter through the manor with this image burning so brightly in his mind, not with the…obvious outward effect it’s had on him, so he unwraps the bandages around his forearms with a sigh.

“This is crazy,” he says aloud to the washroom, but his body is naked and sinking into a nearly-too-hot bath before any further protest can be made.  

He cannot remember the last time he’s had such a bath.  A luxury Darktown certainly cannot afford and one that the Templars most definitely would not abide. No, the last time he’d had a soak such as this was back in Amaranthine after the Warden Commander had thankfully gone off to the Deep Roads without him, and he’d had time to find solace in a quiet room and think.  But thinking is dangerous.  Time to think leads him to dark memories of darkened places and darkened faces glowering at him from above.  Time alone in a small room...he’d had enough of that at the Circle in Ferelden, and part way through his bath, he had burst out of the washroom at Vigil’s Keep like a ravenous beast freed from a cage. Only after a few hours of staring at the vast open sky did he collect himself enough to return to the Keep.

But tonight, in Hawke’s small washroom, he drowns his urge to flee by slowly dipping his entire body below the surface.  The water swirls around his sore limbs and snakes into the creases and folds of his skin where Maker knows what kind of muck has accumulated.  The warmth opens up his pores and releases the toxins into the bath letting him release another pent up sigh to bubble up through the water.

His body relaxing, Anders brings his head above the water again and takes in a deep breath that fills his nostrils with the aroma of Hawke’s milk and honey soap.  His eyes open and lazily fix upon a decorative tile painted with the Amell family crest.  He goes to release a heavy, contented sigh, but he is suddenly aware again that he is not just in any blissfully hot bath, but in Hawke’s tub.  

Where she takes her baths.  

Naked.  

He feels blood rush to his cheeks again as his mind fills with an image of Hawke letting her robe slip off her shoulders revealing her smooth back and bare bottom for just a moment before slipping into the steaming basin. He has imagined what her body must look like under her bulky robes many times, but this new image stirs within him an urge that he has not felt for many years.  

He lets his hand trail up his inner thigh leaving a row of goosebumps in its path.  Sinking backwards, his hand finds its way to his hips as the image plays itself out again in his imagination.  Just as his hand starts moving closer to the source of his urges, he hears a light tapping on the door.

Bolting upright, Anders internally scolds himself, what are you thinking?!  This is not happening!

“Messere?” he hears from the other side of the door as he throws himself clumsily out of the tub, sloshing water all over the floor before grabbing for the towel to cover his...indiscretion.

“Y-yes?” he stammers before slipping on the wet tiles.  Feet fly out wildly from beneath him, but he catches himself on the side of the tub before making an utter fool of himself.

“I am sorry to intrude, but I’ve brought you some clothes.  The Mistress picked them out…”

“Th-thank you, Orana…” He pulls himself back upright and wraps the towel around his waist before turning the knob.  The door slips open just enough for a dainty elven hand to slide a bundle through then closes quickly.

“Dinner will be ready in a few minutes, Messere,” she announces then disappears.

He examines the bundle in his hands finding a simple white shirt and drawstring trousers.  Clean.  Much better than the soggy pile of robes he’d left on the bathroom floor, so he pulls them on and steps out into the cool air of the manor.  

***

Dinner goes smoothly and uneventfully.  Orana’s cooking is delicious and Hawke entertains the table with stories of her childhood misadventures in Lothering until their plates are all empty and their stomachs full.  

It is not until the end of the meal that Anders realizes that he has not once found his mind straying to dark memories, revisions to his Manifesto, or of who might be calling at his abandoned clinic.  And not until he catches himself staring as Hawke dabs her napkin against her lips does he think about what might happen after dinner.

He had been mid chuckle as Hawke delivered the perfect final line to her story about Carver’s first lesson with a sword when his gaze had come to rest for a few moments too long upon her lips.  She pauses mid-dab and blinks at him, so he pulls his eyes back down to his empty plate.  She clears her throat and pushes back her chair, “Well, I think it’s time to turn in for the evening.”  He can feel her looking at him with her soft eyes, so he nods slowly and rises from the table.  

“Thank you for another delightful meal, Orana.  You’ve really outdone yourself,” she smiles to the woman then moves towards the door.

“Is there anything else you will be needing tonight, Mistress?”  Her eyes fall upon him in an unspoken question.

“I think we are all set, aren’t we, Anders?”  He snaps back to attention at the sound of his name and manages to nod again before he follows her out the door and up the stairs toward her bedchamber.

He takes the first step tentatively.  What am I doing?

_What’s going to happen up there?_

_Do I really want this?_

_It’s Hawke...of course I want this!_

_Dreamed of this._

_Ached for this._

_So why am I hesitating?_

She pauses at the top, waiting for him without turning around.  He breathes then moves up the steps beside her.  Wordlessly, she takes his hand and leads him through her chamber door.  

The hearth is already lit making the walls dance with flickering light, but Hawke casually flicks her wrist to intensify the blaze.  She sheepishly looks over her shoulder, “Fenris hates it when I do that.”

The last thing he wants to hear right now is that name, but before he lets some vitriol slide from his lips, he notices her eyes grow soft when she speaks it.  Her gaze drifts up and away in a wistful memory and she releases a deep sigh, so he swallows his curse and instead glances about her room so she can finish her reverie in peace.  Her room is sparse, with huge open areas that a woman raised in a tiny Fereldan farmhold would never learn how to make use of.  Small pockets of personal clutter amid the grand furniture and walls are the only  indication that she actually lives within.

With a slight shake of her head, she sighs and excuses herself behind a changing screen on the far side of the room.  He begins to look about the room again, but a quick flare of light makes him do a double take.  It must be a bit dim behind the screen, and Hawke must not be accustomed to using it, because when she lights the corner with a small palmful of flame, her silhouette is painted in achingly intricate detail over the Fereldan rose pattern of the shade.

She holds the flame slightly aloft and uses her other hand to deftly uncinch her house robes.  The fabric releases from her shoulder and dips down revealing bare flesh underneath.

Anders knows he should not be watching this.  Hawke would be upset if she knew.  Or...would she?  Perhaps she is not so unaware of the shadow show she is putting on for him and this is part of her plan to seduce him.  Her earlier words echo in his mind: _I want you to sleep with me_.  She did take his hand and lead him to her bedchamber.  

And yet, when Hawke’s robes fall to the floor leaving naught but curvy hips to shadow play upon the changing screen, Anders finds his mind is shockingly benign.  Even when she turns to pick up her sleeping clothes from a nearby table, and the silhouette of her breasts become clearly in view, he finds himself turning his gaze away.  

And not that she is not alluring, and not that her nipples are little points in the cold, but because seeing this did not stir in him any urge to see further reaches of her body.   A few years ago this scene would have left him fantasizing of rounding the screen to cup her naked breasts in his hands, to feel her hard nipples between his fingers.  But now, his only urge is to turn and give Hawke the privacy she deserves.  

A moment later, she emerges from behind the screen in a long sleeping gown and stretches tiredly.  He gives her an earnest smile as moves to the side of the bed and slips off her house shoes before sitting on the edge and looking up at him expectantly.

But expecting what exactly?  His chest feels tight and his breath burns.  

“Anders.”  Her voice slithers down his back making gooseflesh rise again.

“Hawke…” he tries to meet her gaze, but is again struck with sudden trepidation making his voice trail off, letting his eyes only get so far as her feet.

She pulls her legs up into the bed and reclines against the wall of pillows.  “Come over here.”

His feet comply and he finds himself at the bedside.  She motions for him to join her, so he moves around to the other side and sits on the edge stiffly.  I can’t believe I’m doing this, he thinks as she scooches closer to him.  He can feel his pulse quickening the closer she gets.

“Anders, it’s okay.” Her voice is uncharacteristically earnest as her hand settles on his shoulder.  He jumps a little at her touch, and she gives him a low “shhhhhhhh….” as she eases him back onto the pillows.  

I’m lying in Hawke’s bed, he thinks as his head reclines.  He turns to face her and she has her head propped up in her hand.  “Roll over,” she says with a smile.

Her hand presses against his shoulder moving him to face the far wall then he feels her body slide up against his. Her chin settles on his shoulder, her hips press against his back, and her feet tickle the back of his calves.  The sudden contact makes his entire body go rigid and his breathing halt.  Her body pressed against his, he should be filled with lust, but instead, he finds her arm coming around his shoulder and pulling him in tightly does not give him heated urges.  

Her fingers tucking some wayward strands of hair behind his ear should be building up tension in his body, but instead, it helps him to release yet another sigh.  

Her hot breath against the back of his neck should be inciting him to frenzy, but rather, it is lulling him to ease his racing thoughts.  

“I’ve been wanting to invite you to do this for a long time, Anders,” she whispers into his ear.  

“You have?” he mumbles momentarily shaken from her rhythmic ministrations.

“Yes.  I worry about you.  Alone so often.  You must feel lonely.”

He tries not to betray himself, but finds himself nodding.

“You do so much for others, just do this for yourself tonight, okay?”

Another nod and his eyelids are starting to feel heavy.

“Can I hold you like this while you sleep?”

“Mmmmhhhhmmmm,” he murmurs as she nestles back against him and gives him another squeeze.

“Just don’t tell Fenris we cuddled,” she mumbles into his borrowed shirt.

“Fair enough,” he whispers before he lets the warmth of her embrace guide him to sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to the perpetually wonderful Lilou88 for desperately needed encouragement and suggestions.


End file.
